Sup Veeky Forums I just bought a 2004 Rover 25 1.4 w/ 65k Miles for £80 with a dead alternator. Did i fuck up?

>16.4k a year

No fucking way, holy shit

yeah its crazy look, the crazy prices are without box.

Yeah like 1400cc

> 1.4L of displacement
Holy shit wtf

What sort of nigga infested shithole do you live in, in order to get a quote that high?

Well it makes insurance expensive as fuck for young people, most people I know have 1L - 1.4L with a few with 1.6. Their slow shitboxes but we cant afford insurance thats 3 x our salary a year.

Rovers are notorious for shitty head gaskets. Keep an eye on your oil.

Also something is off with that insurance quote.

I wanted a 75, a poor man's Jag. Didn't have the money for insurance though.

Has it had the head gasket done?

Pic related, my first car.

>Rover
You fucked up. You paid £160 too much. They should have paid you £80 to remove it from their presence.

These are actually surprisingly good cars, the engines love to rev and they are good fun to play about with. Cheap as hell as everyone thinks they are crap, as illustrated in this thread.

Keep an eye on the head gasket as it WILL go, look into K series issues online. Not a huge issue though as there is a huge enthusiast base with guides on how to do everything and the HG is actually a pretty easy job on them.

Would take one of them over an Astra or a rotten mk1 Focus any day.

Checked the oil cap on the head no white shit so fingers crossed, its never been done but im prepared for it to go

£80 - for a running car, with 8 months MOT and 2 brand new tires? Do the maths user

Gonna look into getting it done, apparently theres a kit you can get with some upgraded partsa that prevent it happening again so soon.

What should I be expecting to fail and when? Its currently got 65k on it?

Headgaskets aside, rover 25s are pretty damn reliable, suspension components are solid.

The 1.4 isn't as likely to need a headgasket as say a 1.8, they just don't seem as prone for them.

They are a revvy little engine too.

What mile range do the HG's usually go? Are there any signs of it going early? the temp guage doesnt go up anymore than a normal car, and theres no white stuff in the rocker cover bit.

They only go once as the replacement ones are a different design without the rubber.

It's not mileage dependant really, apparently its to do with heat and over pressurisation of the cooling circuit. Later ones had a big white plastic valve to release coolant pressure if it got too high.

Symptoms are always coolant related, either passing coolant out of the engine between the head and the block, or mixing it with the oil.
Its a nightmare when it mixes because it turns to gloopy baileys that needs to be flushed out.

Give the water pipes a squeeze when its warmed up, the pipes shouldn't be hard with pressure, but there will be some resistance.

Cheers I'll go give it a try.

I have 0 experience on working with cars, do you think Id be able to change alternator myself on it? Its right near the top of engine and looks easily accesable?

Yeah just disconnect the battery so you don't short anything out when removing the wiring to it.

Remove auxiliary belt and wiring to the alternator, then unbolt it and wiggle it out. It will probably have a good grip to the engine because of the way the alternator mounts work.